Amazon announces browser previews for Kindle books

Wouldn’t it be nice if you could sample Kindle books right inside your web browser rather than browse them using one of Amazon’s dedicated desktop or mobile apps? Well, soon you’ll be able to, and this information comes from the highest authority, the Amazon team itself.

Formally announcing the feature on their official forum, Amazon wrote that a new Preview button on a book detail page will be rolled out in the coming weeks. Click it and you’ll preview a Kindle book inside a browser, thanks to a little bit of HTML5 and CSS3 magic.

The experience should be similar to the Look Inside feature on Amazon’s site that lets you read a sample chapter of any enabled printed book, with an added bonus of multimedia bells and whistles. Here’s what the Amazon team had to say about the Kindle Previewer feature:

Soon, with the new “Kindle Previewer for HTML 5” that we are announcing today, you’ll be able to sample Kindle books from anywhere. Kindle book previews will be available through your web browser-simply click a Preview button on an Amazon book detail page and a new browser window will open containing the preview. If at any point while you’re reading the preview you decide you want to buy the full book, simply click the buy button and it will be instantly downloaded to your Kindle or any one of our free Kindle apps. Because the new previewer is designed specifically for HTML 5 and CSS3, the latest generation of industry web standards, Kindle Previewer for HTML 5 will offer a great experience, with complex layouts and graphic design, embedded audio and video where useful, and enhanced user interactivity. We are excited about this new feature and look forward to making it available in the coming weeks.

Amazon has enhanced select Kindle books with audio and video last week, but those multimedia-rich editions are currently limited to Apple’s mobile devices only (pictured on the right). In addition to browsing, downloading, and reading Kindle books on the Kindle or Kindle DX hardware, Amazon is also offering Kindle software for Windows and Mac desktops and mobile clients for Android, BlackBerry, and iOS. The Kindle for iOS app is a universal binary that runs across the iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Beyond iPad, Amazon confirmed plans to bring the Kindle app to other tablet computers as well. The book retailer countered iPad’s arrival by cutting a distribution agreement with Target and announcing a partnership with Asus to preload the Kindle for Windows app on their netbooks.

The company is also engaged in price wars with rival e-reader vendors, having dropped the Kindle to $189 (previously $259) the same day Barnes & Noble discounted their Nook to $199, down from $259. Amazon is also expected to deliver a Kindle successor at some point that is said to sport multitouch-capable color e-ink display and an app store for games.